


The Legend of the Scarlet Judge

by Veritara



Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, Elder Scrolls Online
Genre: Dark Elves, Dunmer - Freeform, Gen, Lore Book, Morrowind, Vvardenfell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-21 01:57:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16150133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veritara/pseuds/Veritara
Summary: Written in the style of in-game lore books of The Elder Scrolls games, a Dunmeri scholar examines the mythical protector of the Scarlet Judge.





	The Legend of the Scarlet Judge

Every culture has their justice myth, their crusader of the weak and defenceless, they who come to right the wrongs the nobles inflict on the peasantry. The Khajiit have Ma’daro of S’rendarr, the Bretons have the long-time running myth of Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men, but the Dunmer have the oldest. The earliest mention of it in official records dates back to the early First Era and even the long memory of Ashlander oral tradition cannot find an origin for him. The Scarlet Judge, Protector of Vvardenfell. Like many such intangible historical figures, there are few facts that can truly be agreed upon but everyone has their own version of the tale.

Some say he was a banished member of House Redoran, forced to work in the mines before he freed the debt slaves and beast races and killing the wretched foremen, donning a tattered banner of his former House as a cape (or was it face mask?) before marching across the vast isle in search of wrongs.

A common tale in ancient times, as found in a song, The Deeds of Scarlette Bloode, was that she was the trueborn daughter-champion of the False Tribune Almalexia, Mother of Mercy, sired without a father, and reared in Mournhold, only to be released into the world to do the work Almalexia and Her Hands were unable to accomplish for political reasons.

When I was a young elf, the prevailing theory I managed to coax out of my peers — for such tales are not told among nobles and small-lords unless they had been heavily drinking — was that he was the returned Saint Nerevar, protector of the weak and defender of the Dunmer race. Such talk at the time was blasphemy, but after the events of the Nerevarine, many still swore his armor was bright scarlet.

Ask any Dunmer about the Scarlet Judge and they’ll all tell you their own stories — a cousin who was arrested unfairly and freed the next day, a former neighbour rescued from bandits with all their possessions intact, a friend tricked into heavy debt only for the debtor to release them suddenly and without cause. Popularity in the myth of the Scarlet Judge has waxed and waned throughout his long reign, but since the Red Year, the Dunmer have subscribed every odd coincidence, every act of vigilante justice, every moment when it seemed the whole world was against them to the Scarlet Judge.

Yet none can agree on his nature. Is the famous red armor a true scarlet, painted onto steel plates, or simple leather that has been stained with crimson blood? Does the mask leave the eyes to be seen or does it cover the head fully? And of the mask, is the material chainmail, a bolt of cloth, or even chitin plates? By what accent of the many regions of Morrowind does the Judge speak? Who was he before the regalia defined his life? Is the Judge a man or woman?

No single question can be answered and academics — not to mention Morrowind guards — have long since come to the conclusion that no such elf exists. Aside from rare and evil outliers, no Dunmer lives thousands upon thousands of years. Many so-called “Scarlet Judges” have been unmasked as people inspired by the tales and songs to take vigilante justice into their own hands, often with misguided results.

But still, the powerful memory of such a justice myth exists in the mind of the common people who now, more than ever, fight hopelessly in their daily struggle for security and survival. To them, the Judge is a comfort and perhaps that is all he ever needs to be. For when a refugee camp survives the bandit raid, a cornerclub is as likely to break out in fist fights over whether the Reclamations or False Tribunal saved them as to raise a glass. But both sides will back down and drink to their fellows’ survival as soon as one shouts, “To the Scarlet Judge!”


End file.
